Bruton Students Get York Jail, Court Tour

Woman's Club `Docents' Provide Judicial Lessons

April 13, 1994|By JENNIFER ANDES Daily Press

YORK — They walked single file down the damp, dark hallway. Many had their turtlenecks pulled up over their noses to fend off the musty smell.

Cramped in a cell block at the end of the hall, the 20 or so Bruton High School students gazed at the cement floor, stacks of old newspapers and dirty yellow bars separating three cells, each wide enough for a thin cot and small sink.

"I don't like this. This is gross," one student said.

She and her classmates were visiting the York County Jail as part of a lesson on the judicial system the Yorktown Woman's Club sponsors through its "court docent" program.

Club docents, or court guides, bring seniors from York, Tabb and Bruton high schools to the jail and Circuit and General District courts in Yorktown as a public service to the county, said Yvonne McCoy, docent coordinator. The club has sponsored the program since 1987 at the request of the York County-Poquoson Bar Association, she said.

After meeting with judges from both courts and observing Judge Merlin Renne preside over a trial involving a traffic violation, the students arrived at the jail just before noon on a Tuesday.

"We're going to let you experience that feeling of going into the jail and knowing what it's like to lose your freedom," said Lt. Sheryl Castellaw, jail administrator, as she led the students into the cell block.

Each of the jail's eight cell blocks has five cots, but there have been as many as 10 prisoners in a block, which has meant people had to sleep on mattresses on the floor, Castellaw said.

Yahtzee and Monopoly games are in the corner, and a TV hangs from the wall outside of the bars. That way, she said, prisoners can not destroy the sets or have access to the electronic parts.

Prisoners are in jail for various reasons, Castellaw said, including capital murder and drug use.

"It's not unusual for someone to come in here with a $2,000-a-day habit of cocaine or heroine," Castellaw said.

Student Mark Abbott said the cell block at first looked better than he'd expected. "But when she started talking about people sleeping on the floor, it got kind of nasty," he said.

Offering games and a TV is "too much freedom to give somebody who's been convicted of capital murder," he said.

Andrea Phillips said prisoners should not have to sleep on the floor. "It's just too crowded. You wouldn't have any place to walk," she said.

"I wouldn't even last a day," student Christine Davenport said of the dirty, smelly conditions. She thinks the cell is appropriate for prisoners. "Whatever they did," she said, "I think they should pay for it."

"I didn't like it at all. It just made me feel dirty," said Krista Madden. She thinks prisoners have too much freedom with the TV and ability to make phone calls. "I definitely think it should be more severe," she said.